The project

Devon County Hall stands on a 22-acre site in the city of Exeter, from where services are administered for a population of nearly 800,000. There have been several county headquarters, but the current buildings were completed in 1964. Extensions were finished 20 years later, and, in 1998, Grade II listing for special architectural interest was achieved. The county hall has been built around a courtyard in a mix of three and four storeys, culminating in a tower. Historic England describes it as being of “very high quality throughout in terms of materials, finishes, furnishings and craftsmanship”.

Our design 

Client Mitie Technical is part of the largest hard services facilities management group in the UK. It has carried out a series of mechanical, electrical and energy improvements on the county hall site. A1 Flue Systems was commissioned to work on the building’s energy hub. In summary, the requirement was to fit boiler flues, a CHP flue and standby generator flues. There were connections to three 300 mm diameter condensing boilers, an 80 mm diameter CHP unit, a 100 mm diameter condensing water heater and a pair of 275 mm diameter temporary generators. Everything was manufactured and installed in accordance with the ISO 9001: 2008 quality system.

Comments

“The old flues had corroded and needed to be re-routed. That wasn’t as simple as it might sound. As the generator serves the county hall in its entirety, where the offices are fully occupied, we could not allow it to go out of commission. The way around this, to enable us to carry out the works, was to have a temporary generator installed. We dealt with the flues for that as well – all part of a most successful project within this historic building.”

Richard Slate, Contracts Department Engineer, A1 Flue Systems

Facts at a glance

Client name: Mitie Technical

Location: Exeter, Devon

Project value: £22,000

Time to complete: 6 weeks